Hi, Jay James here.
You may remember me from such shows as, well just the one show, ‘Art Imitating Life’ a verbatim theatre production I brought to the Harbour Arts Centre last year for the Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival – which was also my first time showcasing my art at the festival overall. Shameful, I know, I was aware of the festival, but truth be told, I didn’t know that we had our very own festival representation here in North Ayrshire. Which is why I’m back, back, back again and ready to sink my teeth into this year’s festival.
Before I get into things, I should give a little background about myself and how I came to be part of the steering group for NA. I’m a thespian first and foremost, performer at heart and I’ve performed in many shows at the HAC with drama groups and my college class back in the early 2010s, my last show here was ‘Once a Catholic’ in 2012. I went onto study Contemporary Screen Acting at UWS in 2012, moving away from theatre purely to expand upon my acting skills. I found that most of the work I began to produce on my own leaned heavily into protest/advocacy with the aim of fighting stigma across many areas from mental illness/health issues, violence/knife crime, gender identity/sexuality – things that had affected me in my personal life. I’ve always aimed for my art to be a tool in fighting against injustice. I took a decade long break from performing after leaving university so that I could learn other skills, which I did successfully being a barista for a few years then moving onto massage therapy but by 2019 my life had gotten stale and none of the skills I’d learned gave me the energy that I get when I’m on the stage – I needed to return to my roots. It took a few years before I made the decision to return to university to get my master’s and when I eventually bit the bullet, I chose to return to where I’d gotten my undergraduate – back to UWS for my MA in Creative Media Practice. One of my modules last year required me to seek work placement opportunity in an industry that would further my career and being that I’m living in Irvine I instantly thought about the HAC. So, I reached out to Clare Gray-Wilson (Assistant Arts & Cultural Officer for North Ayrshire) at the HAC – who was my first ever drama teacher, so you have Claire to blame for this thespian – and asked if she’d like a little (6ft4) assistant of her own for a few weeks, she welcomed me on board which was a full circle moment for me being Claire was the first person to see my talent. As part of my placement, I was very lucky to be invited along to a steering group meeting for last year’s festival and from there, I gained a spot on the group. It felt right, it felt correct.
So, it then became a game of what will I do for the festival? What am I going to bring to the table for the group? I wanted to bring more theatre to the festival and to North Ayrshire overall because we have a wonderful theatre here at the HAC, and while I hold bias because it’s the first stage I’ve ever performed on, I believe needs to be utilised more. The theme for the festival last year was ‘Comfort & Disturb’ which, I personally appreciated and found to be a unique, interesting theme that would give artists a wide scope to work with. It originates from the quote, ‘Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable’ by Cesar A. Cruz. Which fully aligns with my creative beliefs that art is a sanctuary for those that society would unfairly deem “disturbed” whilst simultaneously fighting to eradicate the stigmas by “disturbing” the comfort of the complacent forcing them to wake up to the social injustices of the world. I chose to veer into verbatim theatre for my project, using real life stories of people struggling with poor mental health or mental health illness who were being ignored by society and the system’s built to protect us to build the story was a vital component to my overall project. Letting my audience see the raw truth, the dark truth with no intention on sugar coating things was my way of leaning into the theme.
One thing I am forever grateful for is the support I got from the festival team during the process. From welcoming me into their steering group in the first place; to providing performance space, for free, so that artists like me can provide work for the festival without having to source funding; to all the emotional and professional support. Especially because my own health took a turn during the process, forcing me to pull out of multiple meetings and at one point, the festival altogether. I had to take an interruption to study on my course and take a back step. It wasn’t until September last year, a whole month before the festival was due to kick off that I decided to push through and finish what I started. It didn’t feel right to let my own mental health get the better of me, not during the festival period. So, I pulled myself together and managed to produce ‘Art Imitating Life’, a mixed-media theatre production featuring film that sought to expose the injustices within the medical systems for both humans and animals, working closely with some of my friends, sharing their stories and showcasing the importance of medical professionals having a lived experience. It became one of my biggest achievements to date, having everything crumble under my feet so quickly to then rebuild it all just as quickly – it has become a core memory, something I will hold onto dearly. I managed to expand my skills not only in acting but producing, directing, writing and I also dipped into water painting for my show poster – which you can see below, along with a link to my poetry film ‘An Ode to Isolation’ that I featured in the production.
This year, the theme for the festival is ‘Reflections’, which while not as unique as last year’s, it’s a very apt theme for such a festival. Like last year, I’m leaning into verbatim theatre again, however this year I’m looking closer to home. A production based on my mother’s experiences with alcoholism and how she was failed by the system time and time again. It focuses on her experiences with a sponsor, showcasing how working with someone who shared her struggles was vital in her progress towards overcoming addiction. Look out for ‘A Drink Between Acts’ coming this Oct (date TBC).
Till then, Jay x
Watch “An Ode to Isolation”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJ3d0BzJbVU
‘An Ode to Isolation’ I have forgotten the taste of sound. The walls bleed into my skin, a slow, wet pressure, like the pulse of a thing that doesn’t breathe. I speak, but my voice cracks, echoing in this rotting cage I’ve built for myself.
Each thought is a shard of glass, a jagged wound I can’t stop opening. The air smells of rust, of things that should have died but keep crawling through my veins. Every movement feels like flesh against the knife’s edge. I try to scream, but the sound is swallowed by the endless hunger of this space.
The hours tear at my bones. I don’t remember the sun, if it ever was. Time twists, snaps, becomes a blur of broken days where I am both lost and found, but neither alive.
A phantom voice whispers my name, but I don’t know if it’s my own. I cannot trust my mind, it eats itself like maggots in rotting meat, devouring anything that could still be real. Every shadow is a threat, every breath a struggle to keep myself from slipping into the dark.
I am a body rotting from the inside, and this isolation is the slow, merciless peeling away of what was once whole. I am forgetting… but it is the forgetting that is killing me.
North Ayrshire Mental Health Arts Festival 